GOD HAS MADE A WAY

EPHESIANS 2:1-3

“Once you were dead because of your disobedience and your many sins.  You used to live in sin, just like the rest of the world, obeying the devil—the commander of the powers in the unseen world. He is the spirit at work in the hearts of those who refuse to obey God. All of us used to live that way, following the passionate desires and inclinations of our sinful nature. By our very nature we were subject to God’s anger, just like everyone else.”

In this world, there is no neutrality in the spiritual realm. There is no spiritual “Switzerland” that some humans can just watch things from the side-lines of life. Either one is alive with the Life that come from God, or one is spiritually dead under the control of the devil. People will take great offense at my reporting what God’s Word makes very clear.

God makes it clear that the human condition of every soul born on the planet after Adam’s rebellion, is spiritually dead. But someone will say, there are good people, moral people, productive people. And that is true. However, Eternal Life is a gift from God and is not due to any degree of assumed human moral perfection or achievement. Spiritually dead people can do things that are right and good, but that can never reverse their condition of being spiritually dead. There is no one more ineffective that a dead person. They cannot alter their state. What is essentially broken can never hope to fix itself.

That is what makes the Good News such good news. God’s forgiveness has been made available to everyone who will believe in what He has done in and through Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection. By turning from self and sin and from any hope of self-reclamation (which is called repentance) and by surrendering to God so that He is not simply Savior, but Lord of your life, you become a new creation by the Holy Spirit’s power. Salvation is never based on what we can do. It’s only grounded in what God has already done for humanity.

EPHESIANS 2: 4-6

“But God is so rich in mercy, and He loved us so much, that even though we were dead because of our sins, He gave us life when He raised Christ from the dead. (It is only by God’s grace that you have been saved!)  For He raised us from the dead along with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ Jesus.”

Please understand this, IF the living today knew what the dead already know of what lies ahead, EVERYONE on the planet would be following Jesus Christ as Lord. Salvation is only the work of God. He has made a way for all to receive forgiveness through Jesus Christ for all who will believe.

EPHESIANS 2:8-10

“God saved you by His grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it. For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things He planned for us long ago.”

There is a hope and a future for all who will believe, surrender, and receive God’s free gift. There is hopelessness for all who refuse to believe the truth, regardless of how much “success” they can account for here on earth. What will it profit a person if they gain the whole world and lose their true self in death, separated from all goodness, isolated, and in the torment of forever knowing the love they rejected?